University of Wollongong Research Online University of Wollongong Thesis Collection University of Wollongong Thesis Collections 1992 Journals of a stranger: documents of a life John David Storey University of Wollongong Recommended Citation Storey, John David, Journals of a stranger: documents of a life, Doctor of Creative Arts thesis, School of Creative Arts, University of Wollongong, 1992. http://ro.uow.edu.au/theses/952 Research Online is the open access institutional repository for the University of Wollongong. For further information contact Manager Repository Services: [email protected]. JOURNALS OF A STRANGER: DOCUMENTS OF A LIFE. A written submission in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the degree of DOCTOR OF CREATIVE ARTS from THE UNIVERSITY OF WOLLONGONG by JOHN DAVID ROY STOREY BA SCHOOL OF CREATIVE ARTS 1 992 JOURNALS OF A STRANGER: DOCUMENTS OF A LIFE. Book One. 3 Contents. Book One. Abstract. 4 Introduction. 5 1. Overview to the DCA program. 7 2. Contemporary Practice: Writing and Photography. 22 3. Diaries, Journals, Biographies: Evidence of a life. 49 4. Intimacy. 67 5. Gender. 87 6. Landscape. 102 7. Journey. 112 8. Exhibition Documentation. 126 9. Swimming with sharks: Nine Stories. 133 10. The Daybooks of Eddy Avenue. 201 11. Images of Manhood. 222 12. Tests in Large Format and Type-C Prints. 226 13 Specifications. 228 14 Conclusion. 230 Book Two. Bibliography. 4 Illustrations 20 4 Abstract. journals of a stranger: documents of a life, is a fictional diary of an unknown and unnamed person. The work is a discontinuous, dual narrative. Within its six parts the reader is given clues and insights to the nature of the diarist. The work is primarily concerned to investigate the notion of a 'life'. Specifically, the ways in which such a metaphor is expressed both visually, and within written text. The significant areas explored-visual and written expressions of intimacy, representations of gender, the renderings of landscape and the use of journey as theme-are the vantage points from which this 'life' is viewed. It is axiomatic that on each viewing the nuance will have changed. journals of a stranger is a work that draws on the disciplines of writing and photography. A central aspect of the work is the interplay of image with text. In that sense, the work uses an interdisciplinary structure, exploring the tensions, and/or relatedness, of sequences of images interspersed with a fragmented, fictional text. 5 Introduction. The approach adopted within this documentation of the journals has been to discuss the themes that surrounded the project. As well, I have placed the work within the contemporary setting. The DCA Program, journals of a stranger: documents of a life, has taken over five years to complete, undergoing several major changes during that time. In order to adequately, and appropriately, present the final work, as well as show significant aspects of its evolution, I have structured the document as follows. Book One. Chapter 1 provides an overview to the project, charting the development of the final work from its beginnings as the Master of Arts (Hons) program, The Manhood Project. Chapter 2 examines the contemporary context of the work, looking at current writing, publishing and photography. Chapter 3 examines the theme of personal writing. It is intended to provide a background to the basic structure of the work. Chapters 4, 5, 6 and 7 examine the thematic basis of the work. For analytical reasons these areas-intimacy, gender, landscape and journey—have been presented as separate chapters. However, they overlap and inter-relate throughout the work. They represent the key concepts of the work. Chapter 8 documents the two exhibitions produced for this submission. Chapter 9 contains the collection of short stories, written for the work, titled Swimming with Sharks. A title later used within the final work. Introduction. 6 Chapter 10 contains the fictional writing for the earlier work, The Daybooks of Eddy Avenue: Astral Traveller. Chapter 11 contains material from the first M.A. (Hons) submission, Images of Manhood. Chapter 12 contains material not included in the final submission. Not only does this work document the background experimentation undertaken for the journals of a stranger, it also shows some possible directions for work after the DCA is completed. Chapter 13 provides a short summing up of the major themes of the final work. Book Two. To fill out the discussion I have included a bibliography and a range of illustrative material, chiefly examples of the work of photographers mentioned in the text. In general, I would note, it is not my intention to examine the work on a page by page, image by image basis. To do so would break up the integrity of the work. Further more, such an analysis would not, in my opinion, yield any more information or understanding of the work. Let me state clearly, I am not trying to mystify the work with such an approach. Rather, I hope to provide an examination of it that does not destroy those qualities of intimacy and observation upon which the work is built. Introduction. 7 Chapter 1. Overview to the DCA. Program. This DCA Program has undergone a great deal of change since the first proposal, Images of Manhood. It is informative to survey that process, for it reveals the creative development of the journals of a stranger. Initially, the Manhood Project was to be presented for a Master of Arts (Hons). The nature of the project changed, becoming The Daybooks of Eddy Avenue: Astral Traveller. After a successful application to convert the degree I was enrolled within the Doctorate of Creative Arts program, June 1989. The final and complete title of the program being journals of a stranger: documents of a life- Images of Manhood was grounded within the traditions of documentary photography. The style being intentionally direct, seemingly uncontrived, attempting by a certain formalist quality to place emphasis on the sitter, as opposed to the particular qualities of the photograph. This approach has an almost ethnographic basis, seeking to describe the sitter in terms of dress, presence, environment and so forth. Certainly there was reference to the work of August Sander. He attempted to document the people of pre-World War II Germany, a project halted by the Nazi Government. Sander operated from a traditional documentary position, trying to record a considered representation. He felt his photographs were faithful records of the German people. Needless to say, this was out of line with the new Germany of the Third Reich (Fig. 1). Sander wanted to present an almost scientific catalogue of people, defining in a visual manner, the German nation. But as John Szarkowski ironically observed, The idea, in principle, was typical of the nineteenth-century Teutonic affection for sorting and cataloguing, a Linnaean approach to 1. Overview to the journals. 17 8 knowledge that has given us systemic biology, art history, phrenology, and worse. The greatness of Sander lies not in his outline, but in his pictures, which give us not only generic types but unique individuals. 1 Images of Manhood operated from a highly personal standpoint. The notion of objectivity being of little relevance. The subjects were chosen at my discretion, without any pretence to sociological sampling techniques. They were to be people that I felt were of importance and interest. The project was concerned with those who may be regarded as atypical, or even marginal. In time, two observations became clear in my mind. Firstly, I could, through the association of images and the use of style, set up a series of photographs that inferred a particular quality on the sitter, such as marginal social status, almost regardless of their actual social position. 2 In the Foreword to his monumental book of portraits, In The American West. (Fig. 2) Avedon remarked, A portrait is not a likeness. The moment an emotion or fact is transformed into a photograph it is no longer a fact but an opinion. 3 Secondly, the visual qualities of the work were becoming repetitive and narrow. The flatness of style produced a sameness, homogenising the faces into an averaged 'house' style. Interestingly, this often happens with portrait photographers. The pictures tell more about the photographer than the sitter. The project was planned to involve about forty portraits which would have been presented in book form. They would have been accompanied by a compilation of excerpts, taken from interviews conducted at the time of shooting. The written section would have comprised a freely collaged selection of comments and observations from the interviews. 4 I had hoped to investigate self definitions of masculinity. The Manhood series was concerned to explore, and make reference to, the larger issues of gender. Although no women were to be photographed, the interviews often explored relationships between men and women. 1. Overview to the journals. 9 Holland, Spence and Watney argue for close of examination of the imaging of gender, for as they say, In this way ideology becomes fleshed out, capitalism constructs its subjects...our subjectivity's and economic positions continue to be polarised by the tyranny of gendering, as if this stemmed automatically and inexorably from the mere fact of sexual difference. 5 More specifically Wilkinson described the process like this, I want to suggest that masculinity and femininity are ideological practices all the more effective because they appear as natural and inevitable results of biology or experience. The appearance of something coherent which could be explained as a property of the individual is precisely the effect of this ideological movement. 6 Or, as one of the men interviewed put it, 'I don't think about it much.' 7 While the Manhood project was based within this theoretical understanding, I was not concerned to engage an academic debate on the nature of that process.